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Effects of Profession-Related Support from Different Sources on Subjective Well-Being Among Chinese Tuition-Free Normal University Students: The Mediation of Intrinsic Motivation for Teaching and Moderation of Dispositional Gratitude

Background

Tuition-free normal university students (TFNUS) have become an important group in Chinese normal university. The subjective well-being of TFNUS not only affects their own mental health, and decisions to stay in the teaching profession, but also can significantly influence their future student's perception of stress, learning motivation and academic achievement. However, little attention has been paid to the relationship between positive factors and TFNUS's subjective well-being and the underlying mechanism and boundary condition. The purpose of this study is to examine whether, how and when profession-related support from different sources influences TFNUS's subjective well-being.

Methods

Based on the Conservation of Resource Theory and Self-Determination Theory, a time-lagged design was used to collect two wave data (N=526), and we use dominance analysis to examine the relative importance of profession-related support from significant others (eg, government, teachers, and parents) in relation to subjective well-being among Chinese tuition-free normal university students, and propose a moderated mediation model to reveal the mediating (intrinsic motivation for teaching) and moderating (dispositional gratitude) effects of this relation.

Results

Profession-related government, teacher, and parent support were all positively related to subjective well-being, in a descending order of relative importance were as follows: teacher, parent and government. Furthermore, intrinsic motivation for teaching mediated the relationship between profession-related support and subjective well-being. In addition, dispositional gratitude only moderated the relationship between two sources (teacher and parent, respectively) of profession-related support and intrinsic motivation for teaching. Moreover, dispositional gratitude moderated the strength of the indirect effect of profession-related teacher support and parent support on subjective well-being (through intrinsic motivation for teaching), and the mediated relationship was stronger for those with high (vs low) dispositional gratitude.

Conclusion

The profession-related support had positive direct effect on tuition-free normal university students' subjective well-being, as well as indirect effect through intrinsic motivation for teaching. Dispositional gratitude moderated the relationship between of profession-related teacher, parent support and intrinsic motivation for teaching, and the strength of the indirect effect of this support on subjective well-being.